Mozilla Marketplace goes live

Mozilla has just joined in the game of digital download storefronts. The Mozilla Marketplace – which happens to look a lot like the Google Play Store on Google TV – gives users a one-stop shop for all sorts of Web-based apps, games, and everything you could want to do in the comfort of your Firefox browser. It just launched, so it remains a work in progress.

Even though it is just an early version, it is already fully compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux, and it’s designed to give users the same point-and-click ease of use as the App Store or Google Play, or to be even more relevant, Google’s Chrome Web Store. So far there are fewer than 200 apps, but obviously Mozilla expects that number to grow rapidly as consumer and developer interest increases.

The reason I didn’t mention the Chrome Web Store as the primary likeness to this is that the Mozilla Marketplace actually treats its apps as desktop applications. Each app is given the same treatment as a regular computer program, which means it can be launched from the Windows Start Menu or given its own desktop icon. It’s more of an extension of your operating system than your browser.